Schlagquartett Köln

Andrew Toovey

was born in London in 1962, and studied composition with Jonathan Harvey, Michael
Finnissy and briefly with Morton Feldman. He has won a series of prestigious
composition prizes including the Tippett Prize, Terra Nova Prize, the Bernard
Shore Viola Composition Award and an RVW Trust Award. Toovey was associate composer
for the Young Concert Artists Trust (YCAT) from 1993-5 and has been the artistic
director of the new music ensemble IXION since 1987. He has worked extensively
on education projects for Glyndebourne Opera, English National Opera, Huddersfield
Festival, the South Bank Centre and the London Festival Orchestra, and has been
composer-in-residence at Opera Factory and the South Bank Summer School. Toovey's
works have been performed throughout the UK, Europe, Canada, Japan and the USA.
His works have also been featured at the Bergen, Brighton, Gaudeamus, Huddersfield
and ISCM festivals and the Darmstadt and Dartington summer schools. His music
has been frequently broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and various European radio stations.

Whisper(ingly) Crumbling (into) Silence (1988)

This percussion trio was written in July/August 1988. The palette of instruments used is: vibraphone, glockenspiel, marimba, three tomtoms, three cymbals, two gongs and two woodblocks. As the title suggests (a very Cumming`s like phrase), the piece is very quiet throughout, and is built on extended weaving melodies, embellished by a susurration of delicate colours from cymbals, tomtoms etc.. This flux of out focus melodies creates a kind of meditative quality.